It is well known that backing up a vehicle with a trailer attached is a difficult task for many drivers. This is particularly true for drivers that are untrained at backing with trailers such as, for example, those that drive with an attached trailer on an infrequent basis (e.g., have rented a trailer, use a personal trailer on an infrequent basis, etc). One reason for such difficulty is that backing a vehicle with an attached trailer requires counter-steering that is opposite to normal steering when backing the vehicle without a trailer attached and/or requires braking to stabilize the vehicle-trailer combination before a jack-knife condition occurs. Another such reason for such difficulty is that small errors in steering while backing a vehicle with an attached trailer are amplified thereby causing the trailer to depart from a desired path.
To assist the driver in steering a vehicle with trailer attached, a trailer backup assist system needs to know the driver's intention. One common assumption with known trailer backup assist systems is that a driver of a vehicle with an attached trailer wants to back up straight and the system either implicitly or explicitly assumes a zero curvature path for the vehicle-trailer combination. Unfortunately, most of real-world use cases of backing a trailer involve a curved path and, thus, assuming a path of zero curvature would significantly limit usefulness of the system. Some known systems assume that a path is known from a map or path planner, which can result in such systems having a fairly complex human machine interface (HMI) and vehicle/trailer position determination.
Therefore, an approach for backing a trailer that provides a simple human machine interface and that overcomes other shortcomings of known trailer backup assist systems would be advantageous, desirable and useful.